Field of the Disclosure
The present invention relates generally to systems and methods for optimizing the shopping experience. In particular, a system is provided to assist a user with locating an item of interest and providing directions to the item based upon a monitored location of the user.
Background
Many consumers visit supermarkets and superstores when shopping for products such as groceries, office supplies, and household wares. Typically, these stores can have dozens of aisles and/or sections. Accordingly, traversing these aisles looking for specific products may be a harrowing experience. Situations may arise where a consumer takes a brute force approach to shopping for products, where the consumer crosses the store multiple times to find all the intended products. Sometimes, a specific product is never found at all and not purchased. Unknown by the customer, a similar product group can be divided among multiple locations, for example, with one type of glue being found in house-wares and another type of glue being found in automotive.
Consumers may use a digital shopping list in order to better organize and remember their items when preparing to go shopping. The consumer may enter such a list at home or at the store.
Computerized devices are known to provide a consumer with access to information such as a shopping list or access to a communication network, such as is enabled by a smart-phone. Computerized devices are also known to include a position sensor, for example, enabling a real-time locating system (RTLS) to determine a substantially accurate location of the device and the associated consumer within the store.
Corresponding reference characters indicate corresponding components throughout the several views of the drawings. Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of various embodiments of the present invention. Also, common but well-understood elements that are useful or necessary in a commercially feasible embodiment are often not depicted in order to facilitate a less obstructed view of these various embodiments of the present invention.